Kairos

There are moments between. They are the spaces between words, between letters, between the dot and leg of the i. These moments are light and awe and the subtle scent of cedar on the Sound. These moments dance with us on hot summer nights, but never tell us their names, leaving us forever thirsty and aching.

They are whispers which bubble up in me, snaking up from within like sprouts from a tulip bulb. Charcoal sketches of bright oily paintings which would inspire Van Gogh.

—

The doorway frames her. The light is shooting from her hips, her hands, her hair.
She is a flame, frost white, so brilliant I must fight back tears in order to keep my eyes on her. She is smiling and somehow even her lips have light blooming from them. Her light is fills the space which is before our marriage and beyond our engagement, this nothing land before eternity.

—

My love is the shape of a starfish, a willow, a crinkled note. I am holding a piece of romaine lettuce, patting is veins dry as I have done with so many leaves before it. I am praying the Jesus prayer and I do not remember how I began. Perhaps I have always been praying it, somewhere down and beneath my rib cage. It does not matter that I do not believe in God, does not matter that I do not wish to pray. There is only the wet lettuce and a cycle of orange and glowing words which pulse like coals on my lips. I was not made new by good news, did not feel rebirth after my death. No third-day resurrection, and no life-giving breath. But I’m praying the prayer of the heart, on and on and on.

—

I wake in bed next to her. I am in warm and vast darkness. I have been holding her hand as we slept. I do not know the meaning of this, but I am grateful for the love which does not wait for morning light. I smile, squeeze her hand, and fall back asleep.